Today’s New York Times has a nice editorial (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/03/opinion/03thu2.html?ref=opinion ) supporting Senate legislation that would restrict the housing of juvenile offenders in adult jails. As the editorial points out, a report by Campaign for Youth Justice found that 150,000 juveniles are held in adult jails annually. In these jails, the editorial noted, these youths “are more likely to be battered, traumatized and transformed into hard-core, recidivist criminals.”
This last point merits further discussion. As part of the “get tough on crime” approach that has guided U.S. criminal justice policy since the 1970s, states began to transfer many juvenile offender cases into the adult legal system where, it was felt, juveniles would receive harsher punishment and thus be less likely to commit new offenses once they had served their sentence.
Ironically, however, the transfer movement had the opposite effect. Several studies show that juveniles whose cases are transferred to adult court are in fact more likely (compared to matched cases kept in juvenile court) to reoffend. Why do juvenile offenders become worse if they end up in the adult system? As the Times editorial suggests, a major reason is that they come into contact with adult offenders. Once they do so, they are vulnerable and thus victimized both physically and emotionally. Compared to juvenile facilities, adult facilities also lack counseling and other programs that can be very effective in helping youthful offenders. Although the transfer movement may have been well intentioned, it has worsened juvenile crime instead of reducing it.
About Me
- Steve Barkan
- I am a Professor of Sociology at the University of Maine. My primary interests are crime,law,and criminal justice and collective behavior and social movements. I'm the author of several books in these areas, including my new book with George Bryjak, Myths and Realities of Crime and Justice: What Every American Should Know (Jones and Bartlett).